


Fortune

by ThunderBoltLoveStory



Category: Hat Films - Fandom, The Yogscast
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Historical, M/M, background historical violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-22
Updated: 2015-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-31 17:50:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3987214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThunderBoltLoveStory/pseuds/ThunderBoltLoveStory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After growing up in hardship in 16th Century England, Smith and Trott set out for the riches of the New World, but barely make it to the South American coast before they find themselves down on their luck and without a coin to their name. The first person they find amongst the Spanish Conquistadors is a young English nobleman, Lord Ross, who is attempting to bring honour to his family as an explorer of these new lands. The only problem is that Ross knows a lot of Latin and a lot of mathematics, but not a single thing about surviving in the wild. Sensing the opportunities that such a noble friend could bring, Trott and Smith immediately offer their service, in the hope that their adventures might bring them their fortune after all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Stranded

“Fuckin’ _row the boat_ , Trott!”

“You row! It’s your fault we’re stuck out here!”

“I swear to god, if you say that one more time…”

“You’ll do what? We’re already stuck out here, it can’t get much worse, can it?.”

The boat drifted, meandering pointlessly through the light current. Overhead the sun beat down relentlessly, with a heat that made the saltwater stiffen into white crystals on their skin, and not even a single wispy cloud appeared to shelter them from the rays. It was a far cry from the wet and windy English west country where they had both been raised. And the mediterranean might have been hot, but at least it was pleasant. This was unbearable.

“We should never have come,” Trott complained. “We should have stayed in Italy. I told you Spain was a mistake.”

“Can’t blame the Spanish for thinking you’re _engullendo el pijo_ , Trott.”

“Ha ha,” Trott replied with heavy sarcasm. “Good one. Maybe you should put that incredible brain power to use and try to think of a way out of us dying in the middle of the _fucking_ Atlantic Ocean!”

“I reckon we must be near the New World now,” Smiffy said. “We were on that boat for months.”

“Do you know how long it takes to reach the New World?” Trott said in annoyance. “No, you don’t. It might take another month or more.”

“Well I couldn’t ask the bloody sailors, could I? They all spoke fucking Spanish.”

Trott let out a sigh of frustration and lay back in the boat. He couldn’t believe he’d allowed Smiffy to talk him into leaving England, but Smith always had been good with words. Back home, when they were still young, it was Smith who’d always managed to convince him to climb the highest trees in the forest and scale along the top of the gorge. Trott had broken his arm falling off of a horse when he was nine after Smith had convinced him to climb up and ride it. In fact, the bone still felt odd in damp weather, which in England had meant almost constantly. But breaking an arm had been a mild punishment compared to what would have happened if the local nobleman had ever discovered that Trott had tried to ride his horse. Only Smith could have talked him into such a headstrong action and Trott had never seemed to learn his lesson. Leaving England on the ship, that was already a leap of faith, but France hadn’t been so bad and Italy had been quite something. It was Spain where everything had begun to go wrong.

Smith groaned and covered his face with his arms. At least Trott, with the faint olive tone to his skin, had tanned in the sun and his loose peasant’s shirt and trousers were adaptable to the heat. Smiffy was a variety of shades of sunburn across his pale skin that accompanied his reddish hair, while his worn-out doublet was really meant for much colder climates. He had it half-open to the waist, but he was still sweating in the heat.

“How’s the water looking, mate?” Smiffy asked.

Trott reached under the seat of their little boat and dragged up a couple of large waterskins. One was half depleted, the other still full. It was enough to last for a couple of days if they were lucky, but it wouldn’t be long until they looked with parched lips to all the water that surrounded them. Sailors a lot less experienced than them knew the madness that accompanied the kiss of saltwater.

“You can drink when the sun goes down,” Trott said miserably. His tongue felt thick in his mouth and his head was aching. He was just as eager to drink as Smith, but he knew the pain of preserving their water was far better than the desperation that would arise when they ran out.

Smiffy let out another groan and shifted in the bottom of the boat.

Time passed. The sun sunk below the horizon to the west and their little boat followed the sun. Their only hope was that this current taking them west really would carry them to land before it was too late, even if it was just a small island. Anywhere with a source of food and water would do. They knew that Europe, the home of civilisation, was months behind them, and each wave lapping at their hull just carried them further and further away.

With night came a refreshing darkness and they drank some of their water.

“The bastards could’ve have given us some food,” Smith complained. “It’s not like they didn’t have enough.”

“We’re lucky they gave us a _boat_ ,” Trott said. “I thought they were just going to throw us overboard.”

“They were pretty angry.”

“We stowed away for _seven months_. Of course they were angry.”

“It was impressive though, wasn’t it?” Smith grinned, “Hide away during the day and then come out at dinner time and pretend you were there all along. _¡Hola Señor! ¡Pasa la sal! ¡Gracias amigo!_ Buggers never suspected a thing.”

“Yeah, right up until the point where they threw us in this boat and left us in the ocean to die,” Trott replied bitterly, turning away from Smith’s smile. “How did you even manage to get into a fight with someone when you don’t speak the same language?”

“Hey, hey, I know enough. My _madre_ is no _perra_.”

Trott put his hands to his head in frustration, “It doesn’t matter now, does it?”

“I showed him though!”

“Yeah, I’m sure that bloody nose will keep him up at night,” Trott said. “Not like he was crying with laughter when they pushed you overboard or anything.”

Smith didn’t like that line of conversation and didn’t reply. They lapsed back into silence. Out here in the darkness of the ocean, and with no moon in the sky, the stars were brighter than Trott had ever seen them before. He still had his knife and there were worse places to die, perhaps. He wouldn’t let himself be driven mad by thirst anyway. He wouldn’t shame his family with such a poor death, not after all the stories he’d promised them when he went off to find his fortune on the sea. They’d never know how he died, but they would realise in time when he never returned.

He touched his fingertips to the hilt of his dagger, but then he withdrew them again. Tonight wasn’t the night. They had water for two more days.

After a while, they both drifted off to sleep.

 

\---

 

Trott was roughly shaken awake the next morning by Smiffy who was wearing a look of incredible excitement. For a few moments, Trott wondered if the dehydration had caught up to him or if Smith had given in and started drinking the saltwater, but he appeared to be extremely happy rather than delusional or insane. It had to still be early in the morning, because sunlight had barely begun to penetrate the thin, wispy fog that hung in the air all around them. Trott was the coldest he had been in weeks, as the mist pressed in like a blanket of cloud, but it was a relief to stall off the harsh beams of the sun.

“Look!” Smiffy exclaimed in joy, jumping onto his feet and causing the boat to rock dangerously in the calm water.

“What? It’s fog. We’ve seen that before.”

Smiffy shook Trott by the shoulders, his excitement replaced with impatience.

“Come on, Trott! We’ve seen fog before, but never at open sea. You don’t get this kind of fog in open sea.”

The realisation took a few seconds to dawn on Trott, but when he understood what Smith was saying he also leapt to his feet.

“Land!” Trott yelled, “We’re near land!”

The two hugged in a rough embrace, dancing around their little boat until water threatened to slosh over the sides.

“We should row,” Smith said, once they’d both calmed down.

“Wait until the sun clears the fog,” Trott disagreed. “We could be a mile from shore in this and never even know it.”

So the pair of them waited with an anxious but optimistic energy, until the rising sun filtered through the fog. Smith’s face fell when it started to become clear that there was no land in sight. When the fog had completely evaporated and the sun was once again starting to beat down on them, he stood and looked around in all directions with shading his eyes from the sun with his hand. But there was no land to be seen and he fell over onto his seat despondently.

“Was I wrong?” he asked. “Maybe you do get fog at sea here. It’s the New World, after all.”

“It’s okay,” Trott assured him. “Maybe the land is just over the horizon.”

“No, it bloody isn’t,” Smiffy grumbled. “I’ve fucked us over Trott, I’ve really done it this time.”

Silence fell between them and then Smith wistfully added, “It would’ve been nice, to see the New World. Imagine what it’s like Trott. A whole new land that’s never been touched by man. Must be magical.”

“There’s natives, though, isn’t there?” Trott said. “They brought some back, showed them off. A whole new lot of people.”

“Well, maybe,” Smiffy shrugged. “But it won’t be like home.”

“No.”

“Would have been good to see it.”

Trott looked up at the sky and saw a bird. It was flying low, with a beak full of little fish. He pointed to it so urgently that he smacked Smith in the face with his arm.

“What-!?” Smiffy exclaimed, but when he saw the bird he let out a hoot of laughter.

“There _is_ land!” Trott said. “Fuck’s sake, don’t just sit there! Grab an oar. We need to follow it back.”

With renewed hope, they each took one of the oars and began to frantically pull after the bird’s path in their little boat. It took almost an hour of exhaustive effort, but slowly a dark smudge appeared that stretched from horizon to horizon. After they saw that unmistakable sight of land, they let the current carry them while they finished off the last of their water. The current pulled more strongly than before and the sea grew rougher as they entered the breaking waves. They had to pick up oars again and pull hard to prevent the counter-current from washing them back out to sea. If they were picked up by a strong tide now, they might miss their chance which had come so close. Luckily fortune smiled on them and they rode the crest of a wave that carried them close to shore. From there, maneuvering the boat to the shore was simple.

As they approached the land, they were able to see it more clearly. Smiffy had been right to think that this land would be very different to that from which they had came. This was definitely not Europe. A long, sandy beach stretched from north to south as far as the eye could see, but beyond that beach and into the interior lay dense, virgin rainforest. Smith and Trott had never seen anything like it before, not even in a picture book or a story. It looked at once foreboding and enticing. But, most importantly, it promised fresh water and food.

They dragged their boat up onto the shoreline and above the high water mark. Even though they knew they wouldn’t be using it to sail again, it would have gone against every training they’d ever had to just leave a usable boat to drift back out to sea. Once they were done, they both lay down on the sand, which felt so oddly stable after months on the rolling ocean waves.

“So, we made it,” Trott said, after a few minutes of blissful rest. “What do we do now? This was just stage one of the big plan, right Smith?”

“This is the New World! We made it here, so now we make our fortune. Come on, you know the tales as well as I do: cities of gold, beautiful native women, all the resources a man could ever need. We clean up around here and then we find one of the settlements and buy our way back home with our plunder. We’ll be rich! Trust me, getting here was the hard part, it’s all downhill from here.”

Trott opened his eyes and looked at his old friend, wondering if Smith had started secretly drinking the seawater after all. There was optimism and then there was just plain delusion, but perhaps this was just Smith’s way of not getting totally weighed down by guilt for having gotten them into this mess.

“Well, I’m going to look for water,” Trott said. “And then I’m going to try and build us a shelter. That seems like the next phase of the plan.”

“Yes!” Smiffy said cheerfully, “I’ll get us something to eat.”

Trott walked north and skirted the outskirts of the dense forest, but he didn’t venture too far in. He rolled up the sleeves of his loose peasant’s shirt and climbed up one of the trees, which wasn’t easy with its spiky trunk. At the top there were a series of wide, flat leaves, more than big enough to create the roof of a shelter. He twisted a few off, letting them fall to the floor. The tree also held what looked like some huge nuts or fruit, with a hard hairy shell. He gave one an experimental shake and heard some kind of liquid inside. Trott slid back down the tree and then attacked the strange objects on the ground, piercing them with the point of his dagger. The liquid smelt sweet, but he wasn’t sure if it was poisonous or not.

Smiffy arrived a moment later, his arms full of the same strange fruit. When he saw that Trott had managed to open one, he picked it up and swilled the milk inside before Trott could stop him.

“Oh, it’s good!” Smiffy said, “Crack some more open.”

They decided to name the strange nut a ‘coconut’ and smashed open all the ones they could find. The sweet milk was heaven after their days at sea with little water, while the white flesh inside provided a welcome meal.

“We could live off these things,” Smith said. “There’s hundreds of them!”

Trott wasn’t ready to sit back and congratulate himself quite yet. He was attempting to tie the huge leaves together into a roof pattern, but it wasn’t like tying knots at sea.

“What are you doing? Give it here,” Smiffy demanded, plucking the leaves from Trott’s hands. He began weaving them together with surprising skill, and soon they had a useful canopy of leaves above their heads, suspended from the nearby trees.

“How did you do that?” Trott asked in awe, prodding a corner of the cover which seemed surprisingly steady.

“Oh it’s nothing, I’m just a competent human being,” Smith said, with a hint of smugness.

Trott redeemed himself slightly by finding rocks and white-bleached driftwood along the beach to build up the walls of their shelter and make it somewhat functional. He was actually quite proud of what they had managed to achieve by the time the sun was going down.

“I told you it’d be alright,” Smiffy nodded, standing beside Trott as they observed their new home. “You shouldn’t doubt me.”

“Hmph.”

“We’re not dead yet,” Smiffy grinned. “So we’re on the up.”

Trott rolled his eyes, but he didn’t bother to argue. Smiffy often seemed like a cynic, but when he was following his own ideas he was an eternal font of optimism.

They got into the shelter and fell asleep with ease. Even the hard ground felt like the softest down pillow after all their hard work. Trott woke up first, but the sun was already high in the sky. Smiffy opened his eyes blearily once Trott started to move around.

“So, nice as this beach is, I feel like we should try to get back to civilisation,” Trott pointed out.

“Yeah, yeah,” Smiffy agreed, yawning loudly. “We have a base, so now it’s time to get rich.”

Trott felt like he wanted to tear out his hair. “Get rich? Seriously? We’re probably never going to see England again and you’re still persuading yourself that we’re here to make our fortune?”

Smiffy’s face darkened. “Well so what? Are you planning to whine yourself back to England? We’re here, so I’m going to make my fortune whether you like it or not.”

Trott buried his face in his hands. After everything they had been through, it all felt like too much. He knew he ought to ignore Smith, because this was just what he was like, but he was angry at the situation they were facing and he wanted Smith to at least have the decency to apologise.

“Look, you go north,” Smith said, pointing up the beach before Trott had a chance to retaliate. “Walk until midday, see what you find, then come back. I’ll go south and we’ll meet back here this evening. Then we can decide where to go from here, depending on what we find.”

Biting his lip to keep more savage words from slipping out, Trott nodded. This plan meant he’d get a break from Smith anyway, and they did need to explore the area. Although in all likelihood they were both stranded hundreds or thousands of miles from the nearest person, maybe they’d been fortunate enough to make land near to a Spanish landing site. Since they had been on the same course as the ship they’d been ejected from, it was a possibility.

They made a quick breakfast of more coconuts and then determinedly set out in either direction. Annoyed as he might be, Trott still warned Smith to be careful. Smiffy was his oldest, closest and - currently - only friend.

He walked for several hours without luck. The world was full of flowers and trees and brightly coloured birds that he had never seen before, but the landscape itself was oddly monotonous. Beach stretched out ahead and behind him, endless ocean to his left and endless forest to his right. The species might change, but the general pattern did not shift.

The sun had passed its highest point and was beginning to make its way back down towards the opposite horizon when Trott decided he probably ought to turn back. His legs were sore from walking so far after months at sea, so he decided to take a seat on a rock to rest. He was just about to get to his feet and start walking back when he spotted the far off figure approaching him from the north.

Trott felt his heart beat in his throat. Was it a native? No, the clothes were too European, surely the natives of the New World wouldn’t dress precisely the same as the fashions of France and Spain. It was definitely a European, most likely a Spaniard, and probably a nobleman as well. He seemed finely dressed, compared to Trott’s peasant garb and Smith’s worn-out doublet. Trott wondered why he was out here all alone, but he didn’t care to stop and ponder it for too long. If there was a Spanish nobleman here, that probably meant they weren’t too far from a Spanish colony. If they could avoid the sailors who had thrown them overboard, perhaps he could buy passage back home for them. Even a couple of years forced labour down in the brig was preferable to being stranded alone forever.

The man didn’t notice Trott until he was quite close. He wore shining iron armour, finely wrought, and rode on a grey horse. He was armed with the same kind of sword and primitive musket that the Spanish soldiers had carried around back in Seville. When he did spot Trott, the man did a noticeable double-take, then gave a broad smile. Trott noticed that he didn’t look particularly Spanish, being almost as pale-skinned as Smiffy was.

“ _¡Buenos días señor!_ ” Trott said, getting to his feet and giving a slight bow; just enough to show respect without being overly servile. Unlike Smith, he’d actually managed to pick up some Spanish from the sailors on the ship, as he’d managed to do with the local languages in the other places they had been. He was a man of many talents, but communicating in foreign languages was a trick that had surprised him since he hadn’t spoken anything but English until he was almost a fully grown man.

“Oh- ah, _buenos días!_ ”

Trott wasn’t an expert, but he could tell that whoever this man was, he certainly was not Spanish. He surveyed the nobleman again, with his pale skin and dark hair.

“ _Parlez-vous Française? Parlate Italiano? Sprechen Sie Deutsch?_ ” Trott asked, then with a curious suspicion dawning on him, added, “You’re not English, are you?”

The dark-haired man suddenly gave a relieved grin. “Oh thank god, I’ve been speaking in Spanish for a year and I still barely understand it.”

Trott had to physically force himself to stop his jaw dropping. Not only was the man English, he sounded like he was also from the west country. Trott couldn’t believe it, to be stranded in the New World at the ends of the earth, just to find another Englishman. It was all starting to feel like he’d been horribly wounded at some point and this was just the fever dream. Maybe when he’d fallen off that rigging back in Naples…

The man dismounted his horse and reached out to Trott with an extended hand. “I’m the heir to the house of Courtenay, Seventh Earl of Devon, but out here you can call me Ross.”

Trott stared at that outstretched hand for several seconds and then bowed more lowly than before, his words trembling slightly as he spoke them. “M’Lord. My name is Christopher Trott and my family farmed pigs for three generations before I became a sailor. I don’t want any trouble.”

Ross withdrew the hand, running it through his hair, but the easy-going smile remained on his face.

“This is the New World, Christopher Trott,” Ross said, not unkindly. “Perhaps not a place where we should be weighed down by our titles or lack thereof.”

“If you say so, M’Lord.”

Trott wasn’t usually one to bow so low, but he had never been near a lord half as important before and he knew what the aristocracy was like. Every peasant boy and girl heard the warnings: never cross the aristocracy, because they could have your head off as soon as look at you. They locked up entire families just for the fun of it. The best thing to do around the rich was to keep your head down and seem like you weren’t threatening them.

“How did you get here?” Ross asked, seemingly unaware of Trott’s discomfort. “I thought the Spanish were the only ones to arrive thus far.”

“We were stowaways,” Trott admitted, half-wondering if this Earl’s heir would somehow punish him for that. “We washed up just yesterday.”

He dared glance up and felt a pang of relief as Ross let out a laugh. Suddenly, the thought occurred to Trott that they were entirely alone here. Yes, the nobleman had a better sword and a gun, but Trott had his sharp dagger… well, if he wanted to strike, there would be nothing to stop him and no punishment for doing so. Not that Trott wanted to attack the man, but it made him feel less afraid.

“I am an explorer,” Ross said, his chest puffed out with pride. “The first of my kind. Marco Polo was the Italian that discovered the far east, Columbus discovered the New World for the Spanish, and now I will explore these lands for England.”

“Oh,” Trott said, nodding along. It was remarkable how similar he sounded to Smith in his overconfidence. “Have you explored very far?”

“Well, not yet,” Ross said, somewhat sheepishly. “In fact, the Spanish have made land just a few miles back that way. But I am prepared! I spent several nights in my boyhood in the great outdoors.”

Trott’s brain ran ahead of him, trying to calculate the advantage in this situation. He was faced with a rich, noble, young man who was desperate to explore the world, but by the sounds of it had little life experience. Trott and Smiffy had more experience dealing with nature than he cared to remember and could benefit from a wealthy patron and a way of securing ship back to England. For some reason, this toff didn’t seem to mind that he was a peasant, perhaps viewing dealing with the lower orders as part of his big adventure. With a bit of work, they might even get him acting and talking like a human being rather than an Earl.

“I could be your faithful retainer, M’Lord,” Trott suggested. “My friend as well. He’s good at carrying things and making shelters. We could be of use to you.”

“Please, it’s Ross,” Ross reminded him. “That sounds like a great idea.”

“Of course, M’Lor- Ross.” Trott said, forcing a smile onto his face. “I could take you to him now. Then perhaps we could visit this Spanish outpost tomorrow for… supplies.”

Ross nodded, then hoisted himself back up onto his horse. He was very noble, Trott noted with a hint of envy. Tall, handsome and healthy, with soft unlined skin that had never spent a long summer toiling in the fields. However, it seemed like he had never had the chance to develop anything but fluff and air between his ears. If Trott could get Smiffy to behave himself and play their cards right, they could be back in England next year and probably with a bit of cash to boot.

 


	2. Easy Money

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having found a young English Lord in the middle of nowhere, Smith is sure that fortune is smiling upon them, but Trott remains wary. Ross might be naive, but he isn't completely stupid either. While Smith thinks it'll be a few days in the jungle and then an easy cash reward on their way home, Trott fears that things won't be so simple.

 

 

Ross rode his horse at a slow walk, while Trott trailed behind, wrapped in his own thoughts. Every so often Ross would throw out a statement or observation about the fauna and flora, sometimes quite astute. Trott revised his opinion of the young Earl. He wasn’t stupid, but his brain was full of the kind of education that an Earl might require, rather than the home-taught education of the peasantry which might allow someone to survive more than a few nights in the wilderness. Trott would have liked that kind of education, even if it would have been worthless to him in the real world. The last few months working in and out of ports at the heart of European culture had made him yearn for the chance to be part of the intelligentsia instead of a poor sailor who could only watch and marvel at the innovations that were currently coming out of Florence and Venice. He could never be a nobleman, but if he’d had the money he could have bought some rich clothes and learned to read latin like all the wealthy could. Maybe that was why he had allowed Smith to talk him into sneaking onto that ship when he’d _known_ that it couldn’t end well. The possibility of a chance to do better had been better than languishing without a hope.

They made their way slowly back to the area where Trott and Smith had made camp. Ross was happy to talk and Trott replied briefly when he was expected to, but otherwise he tried to avoid conversation with his new companion. He was just a low-born sailor; what could he offer to the nobility? Although his initial fear of the earnest young man had somewhat worn off, Trott was quick to remind himself that getting too friendly could not lead to anything good. The best plan was to stay on the man’s good side and hope for rewards in the end.

Smith had already returned by the time Trott and Ross came in sight of the camp and he got to his feet when he saw the figure on the horse. By the time they had approached the newly-built fire, Smith had had plenty of opportunity to observe the man and recognise that he was no ordinary commoner.

“Smith, this is Lord Ross, heir to the Earldom of Devon,” Trott said, giving Smiffy a significant look. “He is an explorer. I have offered our services to him.”

“You don’t say,” Smith said, giving a perfunctory bow. “My Lord, the honour is all ours.”

“Oh, wonderful,” Ross said, clearly not understanding the hint of irony in Smith’s tone. “You’ve even got a fire set up already. How clever you are.”

As the nobleman disembarked his horse, Smith returned Trott’s look, clearly wondering how incompetent Ross was if he was impressed by such a basic thing as a fire.

“If you don’t mind me asking, my Lord, how long were you planning on exploring?” Smith asked.

“Oh, just for a day or two, to get me started,” Ross said cheerfully. “I didn’t really have the supplies to venture far from the port.”

“Indeed,” Trott agreed, wondering if Ross would notice Smith’s eyes which were practically boggling out of his head in disbelief.

“We’re close to a Spanish landing,” Trott added to Smith, who brightened significantly.

“Great! I told you we’d be fine, Trott.”

“I say, where are your supplies?” Ross asked, after quickly surveying the pittance that was their base camp. “Don’t you have any tools or equipment?”

“I told you, my Lord, we washed up on this shore. We have nothing except for our boat and the clothes on our backs,” Trott reminded him.

“Oh, you weren’t exaggerating,” Ross said, giving the roof that Smith had woven together from palm leaves a little poke that made several leaves flap loose. Smith frowned. “Well, I have many tools, it may be enough to do for us all.”

“Can I look at your supplies?” Smiffy asked, before quickly remembering to add, “My Lord?” He was already digging through the saddlebags of Ross’ horse before he had a chance to object. They contained several books, a lot of small metal tools, some aristocratic home comforts like silver cutlery and napkins, and a few items that might be actually useful, including a water flask, a tinderbox and a compass, albeit coated in brushed gold. Trott looked at the selection once Smith had spread it out on the sand, then looked to Ross.

“Where’s your food? Your water?”

“Well, I was only planning on riding for a couple of days,” Ross said. “I have some water in the flask and I already ate my sandwiches.” He smiled and looked around, “Actually, I was starting to feel a bit peckish.”

Trott resisted the strong urge to beat his head against the nearest tree.

“We have food,” Smiffy smiled. “Plenty for all, that’s what I always say.”

Trott raised an eyebrow. ‘It’s mine, go find your own food, you dirty weasel’ was closer to what Smith always said, but he didn’t complain either. Smith was always one to sense an opportunity and this Lord Ross was certainly an opportunity. They could probably live the high life for a year on the price of that gold compass alone. If they played their cards right, they wouldn’t even have to lie or cheat or steal. With his seemingly naive nature, Ross would probably reward them handsomely all on his own.

Ross happily sat with them on the beach as they cracked open some more of the coconuts that Smiffy had collected on his route south and back. When they were done, Ross went to attend to his horse, which gave Smith and Trott a chance to speak behind his back.

“Where did you find him?” Smith asked, gesturing Trott to slide closer over the sand.

“Just on the beach, a few miles north. He couldn’t have left town long before. Was there anything to the south?”

“Nothing but sand and forest,” Smith shrugged. He looked back over to Ross and grinned, “This could be easy Trott, he’s an idiot. A rich idiot. We can let him wander the forests for a few days until he gets bored and then get our rich rewards.”

“Which he hasn’t promised yet,” Trott warned.

“Yeah, but you know these rich types, no clue over value. They think they’re just giving you a trinket and it’s actually something that’ll make you a rich man.”

Trott frowned, “Most of the rich people I’ve known have been pretty tight-fisted.”

“Merchants,” Smiffy corrected him, “They know the value of stuff. This is a nobleman. A stupid nobleman. Don’t you know they get born with a silver spoon in their mouth? They have no idea how much money they have.”

Trott’s frown deepened, wary of Smith’s optimism. “I don’t think he’s that stupid. He’s got a lot of books, that kind of thing. I think we do need to be careful.”

Smiffy scoffed, “You always think we need to be careful. You wouldn’t have left the farm if you’d had your way.”

“Well maybe if you listened to me once in a while, we wouldn’t be washed up here!”

Smith opened his mouth to argue against that, but Ross had wandered back into earshot so Smith addressed him instead.

“My Lord, what are your plans for the morn? Trott and I would like to be well prepared to accommodate the wants of Your Grace.”

He gave an elaborate bow, with a grandiose sweep of the arm and Trott had to refrain from rolling his eyes. Fortunately, Ross seemed no more taken with Smith’s particular brand of flattery than Trott was.

“Please, please, as I told your companion, titles aren’t for the new world. It’s hot enough out here without wearing heavy words like ‘Your Grace’. Just call me Ross.”

Smiffy’s face didn’t change, but Trott swore that he saw a momentary gleam in Smith’s eyes. “Of course, Ross,” Smith nodded, “Anything you would like.”

“Excellent,” Ross smiled. “As for the morning, I expect we should continue on our way.”

“Um, Ross,” Trott said, a little tentative at addressing a nobleman on a first name basis. “I think we need to get supplies. As, ahem, well prepared as you are, there isn’t enough for me and Smith.”

“Ah, of course!” Ross said, only smiling more at this setback, “I did not factor in you and your companion. To town then!”

Trott nodded, wondering what the Spanish landing would be like. He could only hope that none of the sailors from the ship he had stowed away on with Smith would be there, but that seemed like a forlorn hope. At least they could escape this time if things started to go south. Since the Spanish seemed to have allowed Ross to remain with them before he set out on his expedition, they couldn’t be too territorial… or maybe they didn’t want to bother killing him when it was clear that a few nights in the rainforest would do the job for them. In fact, now that Trott thought about it, that seemed like a much more obvious solution.

Smith gave Trott a sly smile as they all lay down to sleep that night under the stars. It was so easy. No doubt the nobleman would get tired by the rough and tumble of the jungle after a few days. Then it would be plain sailing on Lord Ross’s gold until they got back to Europe and to their just rewards.

 

\---

 

The next morning dawned clear and the sun was already beating down by the time that they were prepared to leave. The jungle was a dark place, full of potentially deadly animals judging from the sounds they had been hearing at night, but it was tempting to enter just to get some shade from the sun. Smith was already so sunburnt that he resembled a scruffy pink piglet. Trott hadn’t burned, but was turning increasingly brown under the sun’s harsh rays, and while Ross was wrapped up and protected from the sun, that hadn’t stopped him burning the end of his nose which poked out from under the wide brim of his hat.

Ross rode his grey horse again while Smith and Trott did their best to keep up on the soft sand. As much as he told them not to use his titles, he wasn’t so democratic as to spend the effort of walking with them. He appeared to be fond of the horse though, and Trott had to admit that he had rarely seen a better cared for animal, which was impressive considering the journey that the horse had been through. It had a strange name though; Ross kept calling it Socrates. Trott assumed it was some posh nob reference that he wouldn’t understand.

“How far is this Spanish landing?” Smith asked, once they’d been walking for around half an hour. Sweat was running from his brow and Trott knew he was holding back his misery at the heat and the boredom of walking on an empty beach. Trott knew that a bored and miserable Smith was a dangerous Smith. He gave Smith a look, just to remind him of the bigger picture before he began running his mouth over a short walk in the sun.

“Perhaps two more hours,” Ross said, as cheerful as ever. “It’s a bit slower with you two men following behind.”

Smith gritted his teeth, but he said nothing. Trott gave a small sigh of relief. Smith could be the greatest flatterer in the world when he wanted to be, but he also had a tendency to shoot himself in the foot, especially when he was already tired and bored.

They walked on, three lone figures under the hot sun. Smith turned up the collar of his doublet in a vain attempt to stop the sun from burning the back of his neck. Trott allowed his mind to drift off, to think about things other than the monotony of walking over seemingly endless sand. He thought of his family at the home back in England, who he hadn’t seen in many years. He hoped that they were well and hadn’t fallen on hard times. He sometimes wondered if they thought him dead after so long away at sea. Presumably they expected that he was alive somewhere and would return to them some day. He had no real way to communicate with them, even when he had been in Europe. Even if he could have written to them, they couldn’t read. One day, when he had riches beyond their imagining, he would be able to make sure they never feared hunger again, but until then the best he could do was earn his own living away from home and not remain another hungry mouth for the farm to feed.

His thoughts turned to the young man on his horse a few steps ahead of him, riding straight-backed and proud, even under this sweltering sun. You could tell he had been born into wealth, he just had the look. He was taller even than Smith, who had always been the tallest man Trott had ever known, but unlike Smith who was lanky, he was quite muscular as well. He might have made a great knight in a different era, but noblemen fought with muskets and rapiers now, not greatswords and lances. It was the kind of physique that could only come with the good diet of the nobility. Trott was shorter, and slim - if not scrawny - although with lean muscle built from his years working on the ships. That was a peasant’s body, the kind that had known hunger in its time. The handsome faced nobleman was a man that had attended feasts rather than famines. Trott couldn’t help but feel a rising jealousy.

The beach took a slow turn towards the west, with the jungle to their left rising to form a rocky rise that obscured the land ahead from their view. This was the first real difference in scenery that they had seen and even Smith seemed less grumpy when he looked up at the cliff above him. If nothing else, it finally cast them into some cool shade.

They rounded the cape head to see that the coastline ahead kept turning in to form a long bay. Out in the water, near a small island, two large galleons were moored. On the mainland coast, a jetty and a collection of wooden buildings indicated the existence of the outpost.

“There it is!” Ross declared, pointing towards the landing. “I found the chaps there quite agreeable, even if I don’t understand a bloody word they say. A little bit of gold makes them understand you very well.”

Smith and Trott exchanged a lightning quick look at the mention of gold, but they both attempted to act as if they had no care for gold whatsoever.

“I’ve learned a bit of spanish in my time,” Trott said. “I can attempt to speak with then.”

“If you like,” Ross said magnanimously.

Although the landing didn’t seem to house many men, they didn’t have to go far before they met somebody. A fisherman stood on the shore, hauling in his nets. The catch was small, but no doubt it provided enough for a minor landing such as this.

 _“¡Hola!”_ Trott greeted the man, lapsing into his poor Spanish. _“What is the name of this place?”_

The man looked surprised to see them, not expecting to meet new people in this part of the world, especially people arriving by land rather than by ship. Trott’s Spanish, however poor, did seem to put him at ease a little.

 _“You are in Venezuela, amigo. And this place is Bahía Sur,”_ the fisherman replied. _“Are you the Germans?”_

_“Germans? We are English.”_

_“There are Germans coming, so we have been told. It seems you are not them. English, you say?”_

“What’s he saying, Trott?” Smith asked Trott impatiently.

“He thought we were German,” Trott translated. “But now he knows we are English.”

“That’s all you’ve got?” Smith demanded, “Come on, we don’t have all day.”

Sighing, Trott turned back to the fisherman. _“Can we buy…_ Supplies, I don’t know the word for supplies… _Foods?”_

The fisherman nodded, adding, _“Oro.”_

 _“Oro?” S_ mith asked.

“Gold,” Ross chipped in. “I know that one!”

“I hope your purse is deep enough to please the greedy Spanish,” Smith said, flashing Ross a charming grin. “M’Lord.”

Ross just rolled his eyes, not even telling him off for using a title this time. He tossed two copper coins to the fisherman, who caught them both deftly in one hand. Trott nodded to the fisherman for his help and they continued on towards the settlement.

“A lot of the food they have here is brought from the Old World,” Ross explained. “They’ve barely started to grow their own, but they plunder a lot from the local tribes. They still depend on some of the supplies they brought with them though. At least, that’s how I understand it.”

Again, Trott wondered just how perceptive the young lord was, for him to know that while claiming to speak no more than a few words of Spanish. Smith, however, had ignored that and looked up with genuine wide-eyed disbelief.

“Tribes?” he asked. “Local tribes? They are real then?”

“Oh yes, I’ve seen them here. The Spanish work them awfully hard.”

Smith whistled, “Real people from the New World. What are they like? I’d like to see them.”

Ross gave a shrug. “Small dark people for the most part, not really like anything you’ve seen back in England. The people they have near here are all slaves now. Not even kept like peasants back home, it’s… quite unsettling. But that’s the Spanish for you.”

Smith frowned again, but they continued into the settlement and then they saw some more Spanish sailors. To his relief Trott didn’t recognise any of them from the ship, but he also wasn’t sure he liked the looks he was receiving either. Now that they had Ross with them they were even more obviously foreign than before and the Spanish weren’t looking to share their holdings in the New World with anybody else. Hopefully the fact that they were soon to be moving on would be enough to convince them to sell Lord Ross some food and that would be the end of the matter.

“There was a chap here that sold me some food a few days ago,” Ross said, pointing at a wooden hut that was slightly larger than those surrounding it. Trott looked to Smith, who seemed to be just as uneasy as Trott.

“Why don’t you wait at the door and keep a lookout?” Smith suggested. “I’ll go in with Ross to get supplies.”

Trott nodded and stopped at the door. He could hear the conversation inside as Smith began haggling with the salesman in broken Spanish. Despite Smith and Ross both being even less competent than Trott in the foreign language, they appeared to hash out a deal quite easily with the seller. Almost a little too easily for Trott’s taste. When the salesman disappeared into the back of the shop, Trott shifted around the outside of the building and listened as the man talked to another Spaniard out the back. Trott could only catch a few words, but the one word he heard very clearly was _“Mátalos!” - “Kill them!”_

He rushed back around the front of the store to see Smith grabbing everything in view while Ross stood and protested quietly, wringing his hands.

“They’re planning to kill us,” Trott said quietly and remarkably calmly.

“Yeah, I figured that, his price was way too good.”

“Kill us?” Ross asked, his eyes wide.

“Yeah, so start grabbing stuff!” Smith said. He dropped the things he had already taken into Ross’ arms and then stood by the side of the doorway. When the salesman walked through the door, Smith dropped him with a single blow to the side of the head. Ross dropped several things in panic.

“This is not how I thought this would go!”

“I expect there’s a lot of things you didn’t think about!” Smith yelled through gritted teeth, abandoning any presence of deference to the young Lord. “Get on your horse!”

Trott joined Smith in the frenzy, trying his best to grab everything that they might need for an extended stay in the country. He managed to get quite a lot in the end, but soon there was a shout from outside and they had to run out of the shop, cramming everything into saddlebags on Ross’ horse, and then they took off at a run.

Fortunately the alert spread slowly and they were gone before more than a few men had rallied with their guns. Despite their months at sea, Trott and Smith knew enough about running for their lives to get as far away as possible and quickly out of line of sight for those muskets. Ross was safely ahead on the back of the horse, which he rode expertly even over the uneven ground. Trott expected him to be scared or angry, but when he looked back at them, he just had a great big smile on his face.

“What an adventure!” Ross cried, circling on the horse at the edge of the forest while Trott and Smith stood gasping for breath. “Come on! Before they find us! Into the forest!”

 

 

 


	3. The Map

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They escape from the Spanish outpost, just to find themselves wandering the jungle. Their only hope is to return when the Germans come and find a way home with a nationality they haven't pissed off already, so why is Trott finding that idea such a hard sell?

They walked for about a mile after fleeing the village before it really felt safe to stop and catch their breath. Ross was quite happy at getting out into the forest, but Trott hadn’t been so disheartened since he’d landed on dry land. As they sat on a small, rocky outcropping, he looked from Ross, who was attending to the horse, to Smith who sat with his head in his hands.

“So, we’re fucked,” Trott said bluntly, figuring he might as well be the one to voice the obvious.

“What? What are these words you’re saying?” demanded Ross. “Why are you giving up hope so soon?”

Trott looked to Smith to support, but found none. “Well, M’Lord,” Trott said, with heavy irony on the title. “We have just severely pissed off the Spanish and they were out one ticket out of here.”

“So what? We’ll go to another Spanish outpost when the time comes to go home.”

Smith screamed into his hands, muffling the sound. Ross flinched.

“Are you alright?” When he received no answer, Ross looked back to Trott. “Is he alright?”

“He’s okay, he’s just taking it a little hard.”

Ross frowned. “Look, both of you need to brighten up. Even if the Spanish are angry, that fisherman fellow said there are Germans coming. One of these boats will take us home instead.”

Smith looked up, brightening significantly. “That’s right!”

Even pessimistic Trott found his heart lift just a little. Ross was right. Trott had totally forgotten the fisherman’s words in the chaos. Of course they didn’t know how many Germans would come, or when, or for how long. If they came at all and weren’t shipwrecked, or the fisherman wasn’t mistaken, or crazy…. But there was hope. At least there was still hope.

“We just have to wait until they arrive,” Ross said. “So we have plenty of time to explore. Just like we planned all along.”

Trott felt this was maybe what Ross had planned all along, but it certainly wasn’t anything that he’d had a say in. Still, there didn’t seem to be any better option than to go back and beg leniency from the Spanish. Hopefully they could survive long enough for the Germans to arrive. None of them had been injured in their flight from the outpost and they were well supplied too, better than Trott could have hoped for under the circumstances. Smith had really made a good job of grabbing the essentials under pressure. The supplies wouldn’t last forever, but they had enough to keep them going for a while.

“Come on, let’s go a little further and then set up a camp,” Ross said, rallying them with his usual cheerfulness. “We’re on our way now. Explorers, adventurers, that’s what we’ll be! Best of all, I managed to take this map from that poor merchant.”

He produced a slightly battered scroll from the inside of his jacket and held it up in both hands. It almost seemed to glow with potential. With a quick flick of the wrist, Smith had it out of Ross’ hands before he could protest and Trott leaned in for a good look. It was lightly stained, but not it did not appear to be too old, sealed shut with an unbroken wax seal dated ‘1526’. By peering into the centre of the rolled scroll, Trott could just make out the faint outlines and notations that might detail a map.

“What in the hells?” Trott muttered. Smith went to open the seal, but Ross grabbed it back before he could.

“Not yet, once we make a camp! Let’s go.”

There was just one spark of rebellion in Smith’s eyes, but then he acquiesced and they walked further into the forest. Following the bank of a small river, they went upstream from the Spanish landing and Trott felt glad to have a clear route to follow, even if it made them easier to find.

The forest had continued to grow thicker around them as they walked, but eventually they emerged into a small clearing surrounded by rocky boulders. In between the rock formations was an area that would allow just enough room for them to sleep with a fire in the middle. It was the obvious place to set up camp for the night. Without needing to vocalise their agreement, the three of them came to a halt and set down their things. Once the horse was freed from its baggage, it wandered down to the river and began to drink. Ross tied it up to one of the thicker trees, giving it enough rope to wander a short distance.

“So, about that map…?” Smith asked, his eyes full of that familiar gleam of freed.

Ross sighed, “Oh, fine. But careful now, do you hear? It’s fragile.”

Smith took a small knife from amongst Ross’ equipment and broke the wax seal with one quick flick of the blade. Ross winced and Smith looked up at him.

“If it’s a treasure map, you’ll find a lot more than just an old piece of parchment,” Smith told him in honeyed tones. “You don’t want to miss out on that, do you?”

“No,” Ross admitted.

Smith unravelled the map with an expectant look on his face that slowly faded away. He looked from the map to Trott and back.

“I don’t understand,” he said finally, passing the map to Trott, who turned it around as though it being upside down would help. It had a lot of words, but none of them Trott could understand. Of course, Trott could barely read, but none of the words looked even faintly familiar, not even if he tried to pronounce them in Spanish.

“Oh, a cipher!” Ross said. “How exciting.”

“Oh yes, it’s great,” Trott said sarcastically, just to be met with a slap on the back of the head from Smith.

“Shut up Trott, it’s very exciting!” Smith yelled through gritted teeth, before flashing Ross a beaming smile. It slightly wounded Trott when the young Lord laughed.

“I shall work on the map,” Ross said. “Although if the person who wrote it know what they were doing, it might be quite the challenge. You two set up camp.”

Trott was about to complain again, Lord or not, but Smith gave him a shove, albeit more gently this time. Reluctantly Trott followed Smith, but he turned on him once they were out of earshot.

“What are you doing?”

Smith pulled a face. “Look, he’s still the one with the money, okay? We’re meant to be flattering him. Don’t be such a sourpuss Trotty.”

Trott felt a flare of anger, but then he was ashamed of himself. It was rare that Smith had to tell _him_ not to be such a hothead and keep the long-term goal in view.

“You really think any of that matters now?” Trott asked.

“Look, how many times have you thought we were doomed so far? And hasn’t it always worked out? Trust your old pal, Smith,” Smith grinned. It was the grin of a shark. Trusting him was the last thing that Trott wanted to do, yet his words did hold a certain truth to them. They weren’t dead yet, and if they weren’t dead then the plan may as well go ahead. Stay on the Lord’s good side, find a way home somehow, then claim their reward.

“Okay,” Trott nodded. “Alright.”

They made the camp while Ross slogged over the map, although Trott noticed Smith was avoiding the greater share of the work as usual. For the most part, Smith had pulled his weight on the ships they’d sailed on in the past since he liked to be seen to be doing a good job, but when it was just him and Trott? He acted like work was an affront to God.

Once Trott had finished, he collapsed beside the newly lit fire. Night had descended but the air was still warm - the fire was more to fend off wild animals than to add to the temperature of their surroundings. Ross was squinting over the map still, but struggled to read in the dark by the dim firelight. With a softening expression, Trott reminded himself that Lord Ross wasn’t a bad person, just innocent, almost childlike. His aristocratic upbringing had clearly sheltered him from the kind of hardships that Trott had known, those formative events that had made him so mistrusting.

“Any luck?” he asked softly.

Ross jumped slightly, apparently having forgotten that he wasn’t completely alone. He looked around to Smith, but the tall redhead had passed out several minutes ago without even eating his dinner.

“No,” Ross admitted, turning back to Trott. “Not yet. But I think this is a name.” He pointed to three ciphered words at the bottom right corner of the map. “If I can figure that out, it will help me reason the rest of the cipher.”

Trott squinted at the bundle of letters. It spelt out:

_VPTRK VT ZNMZRGK_

total nonsense, as far as he could tell. “But it’s a name, a name could be almost anything.”

Ross shrugged. “Maybe. But it’s likely something familiar.”

Trott wondered if the map was just a hoax, a jumble of random letters just to confuse and intrigue a random idiot. It would explain why it hadn’t been opened for all this time and why that Spaniard had kept it in his shop. Perhaps he had manufactured it himself and was waiting to try and sell it to the Germans that were coming. That sounded more likely to Trott than the existence of an actual treasure map written in a strange code. It kind of sounded like something Smith would do, had he been born a Spanish merchant.

“Maybe you should try and sleep,” Trott suggested. “That map will be here in the morning.”

Ross looked up, directly into his eyes and directly into his soul. For a moment it seemed to Trott like Ross could see all the hidden plots he had hatched with Smith, to try and separate Ross from his adventures and from his money. But then Ross smiled and the moment passed and he was just an innocent fool again.

“You’re right,” Ross said. “I can’t let myself burn out in a single night. We have a long way to go!”

Trott curled up near the fire, next to the slumbering form of Smith. He hadn’t even done anything yet, not anything that Ross hadn’t wanted him to do. So why did he suddenly feel so guilty about everything?

\---

The forest stretched out into forever. Trott had never seen anything like it. The farm back home had been situated on cleared farmland with trees as nothing more than an infrequent intrusion on the landscape, and ever since they had left, it had been ports and city streets. This endless sea of trees was barely comprehensible.

Neither was the heat and the humidity. While the trees shaded them from the burning sun, they also trapped all the water of the regular rain storms and made the air into a thick, sweaty soup. It got worse the further they went into the jungle.

Ross walked beside them now, the horse far too burdened with just maintaining its own footing to have a rider. Of course it became less burdened every day as their supplies slowly dwindled. The only reason that the supplies didn’t disappear more quickly was that they would occasionally be lucky enough to find a dying bird or catch a fish in the river and that would carry them through one more meal. For all its faults, the jungle was certainly teeming with life. It was just a shame that so much of this life was comprised of insects.

Smith seemed to be suffering the most out of all of them. Every few seconds Trott heard a slap as Smith tried to crush another insect under the palm of his hand, but usually just ended up smacking himself while the insect buzzed free.

“ _I hate this!!_ ” Smith screamed on the third day of walking in the sticky, sweaty heat.

“Don’t lose faith,” Ross said cheerfully, letting out a laugh. “We’re doing so well!”

Easy for him to say, Trott thought. Somehow, Ross seemed almost unaffected by the humidity and the insects seemed to almost avoid him entirely, although maybe that was just because they were drawn to Smith like a beacon. A light haze of sweat, some streaks of dirt and a small graze on his cheek only made Ross look more dashing and handsome than he had before. Trott, on the other hand, felt filthy and his insect bites were itching. Perhaps that was the difference between the peasantry and the nobility. The ability to look good anywhere.

Smith sunk moodily into quietness, yet he kept trudging on. Yet Trott had to wonder when Smith would snap, surely he must. He was red faced, his limbs scarred and swollen from bites, sweat running freely from his brow, dirt covering every place that he hadn’t recently scratched. At least his sunburn had faded now that they were under the cover of the trees, but it was a small blessing compared to the misfortunes the forest had bestowed upon him. Whenever Trott felt sorry for himself and his situation, he only had to turn around to Smith to see that it could be much worse.

That night they set up camp once more. Ross poured over the map as he had been doing at every rest stop for the last few days and Smith watched him while Trott did the important tasks that the other two seemed to have forgotten about. As he cooked their supplies into something vaguely edible, Trott glanced over at Ross and Smith. He had already pegged Ross as a bookworm, but even Trott was surprised at how intently Smith was studying the map. Every so often, Ross would mutter an observation or a suggestion and Smith would agree or disagree, based on no education whatsoever.

In a strange way, Trott felt jealous of them, but he knew that was completely illogical. The map wouldn’t lead to treasure, that much he was certain of, no matter if they were able to decipher this stupid puzzle or not. The best thing for them all would be to get on that German ship when it finally arrived and go back to Europe. If Smith and Ross really wanted to chase that map forever in this jungle then they’d just wind up dead.

Their attempts proved fruitless that night, although the two of them both sat up after Trott had already fallen asleep. When he woke up the next morning, Ross was already awake, but much to Trott’s relief, he wasn’t still reading that bloody map. The other man barely seemed to sleep, yet he rarely looked tired.

Yet again, they travelled on through the jungle. Progress was as slow as ever and Trott could never be completely confident that they weren’t going in circles. Yet again, Smith was the one who seemed the most miserable, although he seemed to have grown used to his suffering. At least he had less of an anguished look on his face and even occasionally cracked a joke. Trott was half-pleased that Smith was feeling better, half-disappointed that his suffering hadn’t knocked him down a much needed peg or two.

Another day of trudging behind them, they settled down at a camp once more. Smith looked all set to sit down and watch the map again with Ross, but Trott was having none of that. He gave Smith a good couple of kicks, until the taller man jumped up in annoyance and started throwing the camp together in a hasty and haphazard fashion.

“Come on,” he growled at Trott after several minutes of mutilating their supplies in search of an edible meal. “Let’s catch something for dinner.”

He picked up a sack and the two of them set off, stumbling through the forest and disturbing wildlife all along the way until Smith made Trott hang back. Years at sea had made Trott even clumsier on land than he had been as a child, but Smith was shockingly graceful for a man of his size. He tread on feet so light that they barely broke a twig on the jungle floor. The first few birds that they found were far too fast to be caught by a man without weapons, but then they came up on an animal that even Trott could have stalked without difficulty. It was a huge turtle, slow and steady on its feet. It had a wise look, like an old grandfather, and it began to walk away from them but it was so slow that it was not much of a chase.

“I feel pretty bad about this,” Trott said, as Smith pulled out his knife.

“Well, mate, it’s it or us.”

Trott gave a shrug, then turned his back as Smith ran up to the creature and slit its throat, then let it bleed before throwing the full thing over his shoulder.

“Don’t give me that face,” Smith said disapprovingly. “You’ll eat this thing all the same once we cook it, you filthy hypocrite.”

“I know,” Trott admitted, as they set back off into the jungle. They circled around, trying to make a more direct path back to the camp now that they had found food. At least the turtle would give them several days’ worth of food or more, Trott reassured himself.

The hill appeared suddenly from the forest, a clearing suddenly giving rise to an outlook that couldn’t have been seen from among the trees. The remnants of an wooden tower stood atop the shallow hill, obviously abandoned several years before. The sharp snapped edges of the wooden posts indicated the catastrophic collapse that had befallen it.

“Well, Trott, up you go,” Smith said, nodding towards the tower.

_“What?”_

“Come on Trott, scramble up that pole, you’re good with poles.”

“What does that even _mean?_ ”

_“Get up there Trott and look over the trees!”_

Sighing, Trott complied with the half-screamed command. Now that he looked, he could see that the hill was slightly too low for them to see over the canopies of the surrounding trees, but by hoisting himself up the broken supports as far as he could, he should be able to see for a fair distance around. He just wished Smith could express these observations like a normal human being, instead of screaming the instructions like some kind of maniac.

The wood was rough on his hands and he cursed as he immediately got a splinter. Pulling the splinter out of his palm with his teeth, he climbed more carefully and managed to avoid another one as he pulled himself up, bracing himself with his knees and feet. Fortunately the posts leant in as they went up, like the bones of an uncapped pyramid, which made the climb a little easier. When he got to the top, about fifteen feet in the air, he wrapped his hands around the top and held on, resting the pressure on his legs.

“What do you see?” Smith yelled up from below, still balancing the dead turtle on one shoulder and holding the small sack of supplies in his opposite hand.

“I’ve barely fucking looked yet!” Trott complained.

He surveyed the landscape before him, barely breathing in the presence of such majesty. Although they had been travelling for days, the jungle was so dense that they had not really come very far. The ocean was still visible and close enough that Trott could make out the fuzzy line that indicated the buildings of the Spanish outpost and the small dots that were tall ships in the bay.

“Hey, try these,” Smith shouted, hoisting the small sack. “Ross had them in his saddlebag.”

He carelessly tossed the bag up to Trott, who just managed to snatch it out of the air without falling from his perch. Hanging on to the post by his knees, he removed a delicate telescope from the sack.

“For fuck’s sake Smith, this is fragile,” Trott moaned, thanking whatever god might hear him that he hadn’t missed the catch. “You fucking idiot.”

“Oh, whatever,” Smith said dismissively.

Trott put the telescope to one eye, his legs beginning to shake with the effort of clinging to this wooden pole high in the air. With the magnifying power of the glass, he could make out individual buildings and ships, even the ant-like figures of sailors. Whoever had made this telescope had been good at their craft. Another reason not to chuck it around like a sack of dung.

Squinting slightly, Trott focused back in on the ships. As a former sailor, he was very familiar with the different styles of ships that could be found in the major European capitals and he immediately knew that two of those ships were not Spanish. Spanish Galleons were some of the finest sailing ships in the world, if not the very best, but these two were more like scows. Trott knew the type as those often captained by the central Germans, the people that lived between the Alps and the seafaring kingdom of Denmark. He couldn’t imagine that any Spaniard would be seen dead in such a ship.

“I think they’re here!” Trott shouted down to Smith gleefully. “Already! What luck! It could have been months or years without a sign of Germans, if they hadn’t been just a rumour, or we could have missed them entirely.”

He carefully dropped the telescope into Smith’s waiting hands and then lowered himself down the post. His arms were sore with tension by the time that he reached the bottom, so he gave them a shake to try and loosen them up. Only when he was still did he realise that Smith still hadn’t said a thing.

“What now?” Trott asked impatiently. “You hate this jungle and the closest thing we’re ever going to get to a ticket home is waiting for us right over there in that bay. What could possibly be a problem?”

Smith’s face drooped. “But- well, the map-”

Trott let out a cry of rage that made Smith stumble backwards of his own feet and almost drop the turtle.

“That stupid map!” Trott screamed. “Can’t you see it’s a pointless quest? Ross is never going to decipher that jumble of symbols and, even if he does, it’s going to lead to nowhere! Why am I the only person in this goddamn party that has the slightest bit of sense?”

He paused to take a breath and Smith tried to interject, but Trott wasn’t finished.

“No! Shut up, okay? Just shut up and listen to me for once. This is all your fault. Everything you do just gets us into more trouble. Don’t give me your crap about _‘Oh, it’s all worked out so far.’_ No, fuck off. We’re just not dead yet, that’s all, but we’re getting increasingly closer if you hadn’t _fucking_ noticed. Look at you! Look at how miserable you are, how sweaty and filthy and covered in bites you are! How could you not want to leave? We need to turn around, _beg_ those Germans to take us back to the civilised world and go home.”

Smith didn’t reply as Trott took a few deep breaths.

“Home?” Smith said finally. “Really home, to the pig farm and your old mum and dad?”

Trott backpedalled. “Well, no…”

“Back home with nothing? Less than nothing? Because that’s what we’ll have Trott, because that young Lord isn’t giving up. You know that fine well. If we abandon him here, and I don’t give a shit about some idiot, but we’re abandoning all his money as well. So maybe the map isn’t worth anything, but the guy following it is worth a lot.”

Trott looked up at Smith with a deep scowl, which only deepened as he realised that Smith was entirely right. Trott might be able to convince Smith, if he pulled on all the persuasion tactics he’d learned worked on Smith over the course of their lives, but Ross was another matter altogether. He had a kind of endless optimism that outshined Smith and seemed utterly untarnishable. Untarnishable, just like all the gold he would one day inherit, if Trott and Smith could just keep him alive, guide him home and earn their just reward.

“I fucking hate it when you’re right,” Trott said sourly.

Smith gave a great big grin.

“I am right,” Smith repeated. “I’d have thought you’d be used to me being right by now, old Trotty. It happens quite a lot.”

“Once or twice does not mean ‘a lot’,” Trott said.

“Whatever, that’s just details,” Smith said. “Anyway, you understand the situation. We either follow Ross on this quest - and I bet there’s loads of treasure, by the way - or we give up, abandon him here and go home in debt to a bunch of Germans who’ll probably tie us up in their gallery for nightly bum-fun to pay our passage home. Which one sounds good to you?”

“Urgh.”

Trott stomped back off in the direction of the camp. Although he wasn’t really scared by Smith’s threats about the Germans - passage home wouldn’t cost more than a year or two of hard work on their ship - he did have a lot of conflicting feelings about getting a ship home nonetheless. No matter how much logic told him it was the right thing to do.

Trott was finding it easier to find his way in the forest. The trees didn’t all look identical anymore and it was simple to navigate his way back to their little makeshift camp. When they reached the camp, they found Ross on his feet, the map outreached in his hands and a huge grin on his face.

“I’ve done it!” Ross howled in triumph. “I did it! I figured out the cipher!”

Smith and Trott were frozen together for a moment and then Smith let out a cheer and ran over, celebrating with the young Lord. All thought of the German ship was lost except to Trott, who kept his mouth shut and resolved not to say a word. He stayed where he was, watching them both with a sinking feeling in his chest, wondering if he was making a terrible, terrible mistake.

 


End file.
